Playing with Watercolors

I have some watercolor painting supplies, so, since I've been feeling the need for a tactile art, so, why not?

Watercolor 1 and 2:

and Goache:

Kombucha

So, every year I abandon my kombucha to fate and then buy a small scoby on ebay and start making it again.  This year I must not've cleaned my jar properly because I can see moldy green.  Tsk, tsk.

Stargate SG-1 fans, look at this!

Whooooaaaaaaa. 'Working' Stargate model.

Gratsi Old Country White

Tonight I am trying a white wine from Gratsi, Old Country White, which I found via Instagram, and is 'Old World Style', with less sugar.  Apparently sugar is bad for you, who knew.

I bought a sampler pack of red and white, and tonight I opened up the white.  This is a boxed wine, which some might look down on, but it tastes like a decent easy-drinking table wine type white wine to me, so, I shan't judge.

Julien Cruchandeau Les Valançons Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Nuits

Please dont expect me to speak with expertise about French wine, it would be absurd of me to try. I am always curious about small local purveyers of whatever a product might be, in this case, the burgundy wines imported into the USA by Elden Selections, based themselves in the Burgundy region. I am trying Julien Cruchandeau and ordered 4 bottles, including this one, Julien Cruchandeau Hautes Cotes de Nuits 'Valencons' 2018. It's described as juicy and exuberant.

It's winter where I live, so try as I might, the room temperature I'm serving this wine at is a little cool and I think that affects the taste. I am warming it by holding it in my hands...but holding a wineglass in my hands prompts me to drink from it, so we'll see how well that goes.

Skin

(National Poetry Month HitRECord challenge)

Tug you close
in the morning
news murmuring on the radio
me murmuring in your hair.

Wrap those arms around me,
hold me in the early sunlight
just pushing aside the curtains
in our warm little lover's room.

Skin to skin, but baby, I gotta go,
when the daily bread calls.
Still, joined at every joint, every pore,
every cell, we are, together.

This is My Heart

(National Poetry Month HitRECord challenge)

This is my heart:
it is made of clay
and bits of leaves
and the seeds of bitter melons.

Hold it cupped,
Like an offering,
Because it is.

Breathe upon it,
and it will beat,
for you, one-two,
one-two.

Love

(National Poetry Month HitRECord challenge)

Love
Does not reside
in the heart
like a box
that only opens
once
per
beat.

Oh, no, it is in
the marrow of my
leg bones,
the hinge of my knees,
the way both tremble
and shudder
when you exhale.

It is in the sinew,
the soft belly under my navel,
my fingertips and calluses,
in each strand of muscle
that stretches,
and pulls
Us together.

Hear Me

(National Poetry Month HitRECord challenge)

I am that wicked creature
that is not man,
but Lilith's daughter;
I come now to say unto you:

I am the knife in your night,
the dragging step on your dark stair,
the bell, the book and the candle,
the midnight striking in your clockless room.

I am the low-flying bomber you don't hear coming,
I am the human mislabeled as man's rib,
I am the disregarded, deep inside your defenses.

I am the banked fire and the luminous fury,
Every catcall is fuel for my flames.
You have never seen me coming,
Because you never thought to look.

Late Blossom

(04/27/2016 National Poetry Month HitRECord challenge)

The cherry blossoms
Have fallen all but one: Late,
nestled, at the heart.

Oh Girl

(04/26/2016 National Poetry Month HitRECord challenge)

Oh, girl

I got the gun,
still warm in my hand,
and powder residue
gonna send me to the chair.

Oh, girl,
Oh, girl,
Oh, girl, she dead on the floor
And me dead with her.

I thought:
She betrayed me,
Broke her promise
To be true,
And what promised me,
She let loose in the sheets
of some other man.

Oh, girl,
Oh, girl,
Oh, girl, she dead on the floor
And me dead with her.

I could blame Iago
But it's me what done it:
Took to doubt like liquor,
And pulled that trigger.

Oh, girl.

When It's All Gone

(04/25/2016 National Poetry Month HitRECord challenge)

When it's all gone:
the warm divot of the pillow,
the scent on the shirt,

When it's all gone,
when there's nothing left
but your pain, your loss,
the tears in the back of your throat,

How can you let that pain go,
when it is the last piece of your love,
so still and so precious,
left cupped in your hands?

Civil

(04/24/2016 National Poetry Month HitRECord challenge)

There is a muddy patch at Gettysburg
That has eaten the names and lives
of countless boys in uniform.

The earth beneath the rows of cannons
is drunk on blood and valiant speeches.

None can tell the color of their clothes any more.
Soldier and foe look the same when they're dead,
Spoiled together across green farmland that now only dreams in red.

Silence

(04/23/2016 for National Poetry Month HitRECord challenge)

If you are quiet enough,
you can hear the books
conversing amongst themselves,

They rustle sentences
to each other made of paper and cloth,
trade witticisms,
anagrams,
and drop verse on the heads
of the shelving librarians
who don't duck quickly enough.

People think writer's block is a metaphor, but it's not

(04/22/2016 National Poetry Month HitRECord challenge)

It's a big wooden block,
perched on the floor
between me and the page.

You can see the grain,
patterned in loops and swirls,
that you can follow with your thumb.
Beautiful, really, but still a block.

You have to come at it with a sharp knife,
sharper than the one used to gut poetry
from the belly of the carp that lurks in the pool of your mind,
gulping verse.

Whittle it along the edges,
Distract it by humming,
Round it with your hands and blade until the corners smooth,
and your palms know the feel of it, inside and out, and it knows you
Better than your mother ever did.
Then: push.